


the cocoa you give me, the one I can't deny

by kangelique



Series: The Captain Swan Playlist [25]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: After missing year, Confessions, Deleted scenes for season 3, Emma wants to fuck feelings but Killian is making it impossible, Emma's still dealing with coming home, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Granny's Diner, Home in Killian, Hot Cocoa, Intense, Late Night Conversations, Maybe's, Mutual Pining, little bit of grief, quiet moments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:33:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27464236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangelique/pseuds/kangelique
Summary: These days returning to their good life in New York feels like a pipe dream to Emma.Maybe that's why every night she drives to the town line, just to contemplate leaving, just because it would be easier. But she can't, and of course it's Hook she comes across at the diner.The seat next to him is open and he has his secrets too. Except she has a question that's been eating at her, ever since he came back looking like the ghost of the villain he used to be."Did you miss me?"It's scary as hell what he means when he offers her the answer and friendship and a cup of hot cocoa.
Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan
Series: The Captain Swan Playlist [25]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1327670
Kudos: 21





	the cocoa you give me, the one I can't deny

**the cocoa you give me, the one I can't deny:**

Emma released a long, resigned sigh after killing the ignition. Almost immediately, the bug’s indignant coughing and sputtering died to nothing but silence and her bouncing thoughts. Her grip tightened on the steering wheel. She could relate better than most about getting thrown into a new routine and these sixty minute drives through the woods all the way to the town line were quickly putting a hiccup on the bug’s stamina.

In New York, she’d held back from using it because of the cabs and buses and the ugly reminder of Neal, but ever since getting smacked by her memories and Hook’s very blue eyes? She was back to needing it. Ignoring the dark circles under her eyes in the rearview mirror that hinted that the bug wasn’t the only one having a hard time adjusting to this new -old?- reality, she finally removed her keys and slammed the door shut behind her. 

She walked briskly past the fence and empty tables falling victim to late autumn’s leaves sweeping mindlessly with the nudge of the wind and climbed the couple steps to Granny’s diner. Obviously it was wishful thinking no one in Storybrooke would notice her roaming the streets at night and with Leroy’s big mouth, most likely to end up reaching Mary Margaret’s ears. And David wasn’t blind. Or her kid. But if either of them had caught a whiff of her slipping out of her room of the Bed & Breakfast, they didn’t mention it, and she wasn’t a fan of offering explanations. 

Opening the door, Emma stopped short. “Oh.” She tried to school her features into not betraying her surprise at Hook’s presence, sitting alone on one of the stools at the far end of the counter. Her lips bravely tried the polite smile but it fell into a grimace once the day’s events -or  _ one  _ event. Her and him and a farmhouse and a conversation about a broken heart distracting them from tracking-washed over her as his eyes met hers. “Hey,” she said tersely. 

That was their trademark, right? The space between them was always brimming with tension because of something he said and the same something she denied. 

He nodded and a delayed smile broke across his lips. “Hello, love.” He gestured to the free seat next to him with his hook and Emma bit back a snort because  _ no shit, genius, we’re the only ones here _ as she debated between making an excuse or letting go of the handle. But then he took a swig of his flask and if there was one thing dealing with the wicked witch’s mind games demanded, it was alcohol. “Trouble resting?” he asked, faint amusement flickering in his eyes after she’d plopped on the stool, swiped the flask from him, and taken a healthy swig of her own. 

“It’s Storybrooke.” Her cheeks puffed out with her breath and she wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her jacket. “When is there ever a moment of peace.” 

“The curse of living in this town, aye?”

“You have no idea,” she muttered. 

First the Dark Curse, then Cora, then Greg and Tamara, then freaking Peter Pan. It was a miracle they had time to eat breakfast or fall in love or get the town functioning. 

Emma shook her head and straightened, rolling her shoulders back as she handed him back his flask. Like in Neverland, the pads of his fingers gently covered her knuckles and his gaze, open and curious, bore into hers. She wasn’t stupid. He was hurt after their conversation, after admitting she loved Walsh, and she was on edge because he’d reminded her she hadn’t gone numb yet. Inhaling a sharp breath, Emma pulled her hand to clasp with her other one and furrowed her eyebrows. “Wait, what are you doing here?” Her lips tweaked in a challenging smirk. “Scared to sleep with the Wicked Witch of the West just down the street?”

He closed his eyes and scrubbed a hand down his face, and it was when she finally absorbed the weariness in the hair that had been pushed back by restless fingers too many times, in the slumped posture, like all the invisible weight was pressing on his innuendos and salacious smirks and keeping his lips tied to sipping. 

He looked, in one word, haunted, and she opened her mouth to ask why when he beat her to it. “Make no mention to Granny, but I’m afraid her mattresses are rather uncomfortable.”

Emma studied him, but he continued staring ahead into the past. There was more to it. Heck, there was more to her driving to the town line at midnight, but he said it was his tale and he was sticking to it and she didn’t want to put a label on her shit. “I’m guessing it must be a huge adjustment for you too, but that bed in your captain’s quarters didn’t look too comfortable either,” she bated. 

His eyebrows arched. No wiggling. No dancing. Just two eyebrows looking affronted. “Your lad appeared to think differently.”

“Henry was tired Pan -Mr. Gold-I mean Rumplestiltskin’s dad had just taken his heart,” Emma huffed. Her temples throbbed, but she refused to knead them with her thumbs. Not in front of him. Or anyone. One of the many reasons she waited until everyone was asleep to come to Granny’s. She was the savior, right? No problem. She just had to remember their family tree was a mess and that there was  _ another  _ villain trying to destroy their happy endings. 

Her shoulders slumped. Another one. Add it to the growing pile. 

“Love.” His voice was soft, knowing, acting like a medicine, and she stiffened. 

“Don’t forget what I said in New York, don’t call me love,” Emma said sharply. Did she mean it? Out of the corner of her eye, his small smile shifted into a frown and a numbness rolled through his expression, taking care of masking his true feelings from her knives. And no. When he scooted slightly, boots planting on the bars of the stool to control the permanency of his bending back towering over his flask,  _ no.  _ She didn’t mean it. She didn’t want the pain he was drowning with every sip to have her name on it. 

“Or you’ll have me thrown in the brig, yes?” he chuckled wryly, distantly. 

Emma smirked. “I am sheriff,” she said, but her attempt at lightning the dark canyon between their thighs backfired when he nodded. 

“Lovely.” His smirk mirrored hers, but it lacked the ability to creep under her skin. Her eyes searched, a little desperate, maybe because witnessing his walls drain the emotion from his voice tugged at the guilty strings of her heart. Her lips parted, ready to goad him into their safety net, into flirting that was genuine, but he cleared his throat. “I imagine this might be as difficult an adjustment for you as it for me.”

She frowned. “Why, I don’t have any swashbuckling adventures I’m missing out on,” she mocked, swallowing the lump quickly rising to her throat. She had a good life to get back to. Without Walsh, without the man who’d only  _ kind of liked her _ . Whatever. She had Henry. So what if she’d told Killian the truth? Her heart was broken, her trust was shattered, and the longer she stayed in Storybrooke the fiercer her walls rose to block  _ feeling,  _ a bunch of distorted feelings. 

But then Killian had stepped forward and promised straight into her eyes that she could still feel and she had walked away because what he’d stirred in her chest at the moment was something she  _ did not  _ want to feel.

Fuck feelings. 

“Swan,” he insisted. 

“Fine,” Emma snapped. “Why do you say that?”

His eyes flashed with understanding. “Open book,” he replied cheekily. 

Their gazes locked in a moment of  _ seriousness, let’s be serious for one goddamn second.  _ With his encouraging smile egging her on, she inhaled a deep breath. “I forgot how it was here,” she whispered. 

“I see.”

He didn’t just see. 

And that was the worst thing about returning. 

Back to eyes that saw her. 

**********

Neal was gone.  _ Dead.  _ His last breath drawn right in her arms. But it was  _ her,  _ that bitch, the unapologetic way she’d paraded into the diner this morning flashing the dagger like a coward that had Emma stomping on the gas. The worst part was Henry’s disregard at the wake, the one she’d unconsciously planted when she’d hesitated at Neal’s desire to see him, the one Past Henry didn’t deserve to have. Regret pressed her lips together. Of course it was her fault. Of course anything she’d said to make him feel better,  _ something  _ for his dad, would fall short. 

Hook was right. Henry deserved to remember his dad. A year ago when Pan’s curse was coming she’d asked Regina to preserve their memories. She’d wanted to remember her family even if they had to say goodbye forever. What was wrong with her, deliberately keeping Henry in their good life for fear that he would prefer his old life? Everything in New York - the trips to the zoo, rewatching the Star Wars series, going out for gelato, just doing nothing- tugged with a vengeance at her attempts to sleep. 

Screw sleeping. Her days of resting were over. Taking the bug out for another midnight drive to the townline to stew about the unfairness she felt pooling in her chest was proof of it. 

Her sigh, along with the pounding of her steps racing toward the diner, echoed into the night. 

Maybe hurling multiple darts at the wall again would help. 

“Hook,” Emma breathed as soon as the bell jingled above her, signaling the door closing and the brooding man at the counter she’d walked in on. 

His gaze snapped towards her and he nodded his soft smile. “Swan,” he said warmly. She’d be lying if she hadn’t expected his tone to be cold, tired of repeating things she knew and he knew were unescapable, but instead his voice was the sun chasing the chill gathered in her bones and ridding her skin of the goosebumps she’d accumulated thanks to the bug’s broken heater. His eyes were just right too, not too fixated, not too sweltering with purpose, but a light blue hoping to hug her. 

_ No.  _

She wasn’t here to stay, right? Right. 

A frown twisted her lips. “Don’t you ever go to sleep?”

“Of course.” He gestured to the seat next to him. Emma hesitated and his smile fell. Blame Storybrooke for the string of bad days she was having that forced her to march up to the counter and spark the smile back. An old voice, evoked from her walls, told her she shouldn’t feed off his smile so much, shouldn’t be so dependent on the playful smirk he sent her way to light a match. “I must maintain my youthful glow by some means, darling, seeing as Neverland cannot do it for me.”

Emma rolled her eyes. “Right, I forgot you’re like three hundred years old.”

“More like two hundred,” he replied indignantly and she giggled.  _ Oh fuck.  _ Giggled because his head snapped back and his hook flew to his wounded pride. At the sound, his eyes grew tender but his eyebrows were wicked. “My devilishly handsome face can confirm it,’ he said. 

She shook her head, but her eyes drifted to his face and finally got a good look at the past year’s toll on him. Back in New York, she’d been too shocked. Now in Storybrooke, she’d been too stressed. But at the moment, one traitor butterfly fluttered its agreement in her belly. “Granny, leave anything out?” Emma asked quickly, turning her gaze to the empty counter. 

“No onion rings, sadly.”

“Damn.” She shrugged and tensed at the same time. “Tomorrow then, if the Wicked Witch doesn't decide to crash lunch.”

His jaw clenched. “She does have a tendency to come in the most inopportune of times.”

There was an understatement. And like a shockwave, the day curled her fists on the countertop. “I’m gonna make her pay for what she did to Neal,” Emma said through gritted teeth. 

He sighed, resonating his preparation. “I agree Baelfire deserves justice but-”

“Don’t let anger overcome me, yeah, yeah.” Emma waved him off. “God, you’re starting to sound like Archie.”

“Here.” 

Her vision was suddenly held captive by a steaming mug topped by whipped cream and the familiar sprinkles of cinnamon obscuring the waiting cocoa underneath. Her fist uncurled enough to wrap her fingers around the handle and lean forward to take a small whiff of the sweet scent. “I thought you said Granny didn’t leave anything,” Emma licked her lips anticipatedly and opened her eyes to find him staring at her. 

“I was being earnest, love,” he whispered. 

“Then how…?” She narrowed her eyes, glancing from the cocoa to him, when the proud hint sitting on the corner of his muffled grin registered in her haze. “Oh.” How was she supposed to feel about that? About Killian Jones offering her the pieces of a home, comfort and warmth? She dropped her eyes and shifted on the stool. “Thanks.”

A moment passed. 

They were both silent. 

She couldn’t look at him, but his shallow breathing was clear. 

“Well I suppose I should be retiring to my chamber.”

Her head snapped up. “We’re having a meeting tomorrow,” Emma blurted, for some reason unwilling to hear him say goodnight. She’d assumed he’d sit longer, he’d talk more. Her mistake. She cleared her throat, blinking in the new lonesome air. “Just to talk about our next move,” she clarified. “In the morning, if you want to come.”

_ If.  _

His choice. 

If he wanted to be a part of something. With her. With everyone. 

“Of course,” he replied lowly, eyes looking at her like he’d never say any less. “As long as you wish me to be.”

Her throat was thick with the truth. Of course she fucking wanted him there. He was her friend. He brought light to any situation with his quips and melted the stiffened bars around her heart with his stupid smolder.  _ Of course.  _ But she was still the savior, she still let a beat fly without confirmation. 

Disappointment shadowed his expression and he gave her a slight bow. “I bid you goodnight, Swan.”

Emma bit her lip and nodded. “Uh, wait, did Henry tell you about this, the cocoa thing?” She was crossing her fingers. She was crossing her arms and legs that Hook hadn’t proved his ability to read her like a book again. 

The dimmed fluorescent bulbs flickered despite herself when he said, “Perspective, is all.”

And maybe it wasn’t darts she needed. 

Maybe it was the cocoa he’d given her. 

**********

Finally they had pieced together Zelena’s plan, but where usually getting answers would bring relief, it only confirmed the rightful sense of dread sliding onto every one of their expressions in Regina’s study. 

The fact that she could fade into nothingness and her entire life, her kid, her family, her broken heart would never exist hit Emma as hard as the wind smacking her face when they all left Regina’s house, scattering to different places to panic in silence. She’d strapped her seatbelt across her chest, willed the bug into roaring to life, and violently shoved her foot on the gas so fast her tires caused several neighbors to peek from behind their curtains. 

The minute her headlights illuminated the Leaving Storybrooke sign, she jumped to a sudden stop. Figuring out Zelena’s intentions had only piled onto her reasons to leave. Officially leave. New York’s appeal was enhanced. No time-travel shit, no random vengeful sister, no curses withholding her memories would be there. But rationally thinking she couldn’t escape. She was entangled in this, thanks to this Ava person -her grandmother?-who’d spilled a secret too. 

Damn. So much for thinking her family were the good guys. 

She strode into Granny’s diner and this time no surprise twisted her features into a mask of defense or prompted ugly words on her tongue to feed into the cavern of distance he was guilty of creating these days. Something was wrong. Her gut had told her, waving red flags every time Hook refused to meet her gaze. He was hiding something. Whatever it was it couldn’t be that bad, right? He hadn’t lied, about anything. But the burden of keeping his lips pressed together in her company displayed on his face, and she wanted to know, hours ago she’d been close to inching him to tell her, to trust her, but then Belle had rushed in and well…

Now all she wanted was the cup of cocoa he nudged to her side of the booth as soon as she dropped down with a sigh -the cocoa she’d  _ magicked  _ into his hand by concentrating on the image of his calloused fingers, sturdy palm, the tight grip they’d have on the handle, how that same hand would feel holding her.

She grabbed the mug.  _ Enough about thinking things she shouldn’t be thinking of.  _ And she raised it to take a sip. 

“It’s crazy, huh?” Rhetorical question, of course. Everything was a mess.  _ She  _ was a mess for letting the picture of his hand persist. 

He quipped an eyebrow, the intentions of an amused smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth and tugging all rhetorical questions into the water. “The amount of sugar that is added to your drink, indeed.”

She rolled her eyes but smiled at his warm chuckle. “Shut up,” she said and took a larger slurp to keep his eyes glittering. 

After a moment, they both tensed in their companionable silence. He glanced at the fingers absently stroking the tip of his hook and she glanced at the sudden wobble her grip on the handle did. The lightness she’d managed to hold for a couple seconds had evaporated and god he was making it so difficult to meet his eyes, to will his humor to join hers. 

She placed the cup down with a clatter that reverberated throughout the diner. Fine.  _ Fine. _ He had a secret and he wouldn’t say it. Only business today. 

“I meant Zelena’s plan.” Emma faltered, lips grimacing. “You really think she’s going to pull it off?”

“Nonsense.” Her eyes widened, but he sailed on smoothly. “You’ll defeat her before she has the chance.”

He was all serious ocean eyes. His face left no room for another opinion. His smile was the definition of encouragement. 

Emma sighed. “I wish I was as sure as you.”

He shook his head. “I’ve yet to see you fail, love.” 

She froze.  _ Neverland.  _ Back when she was hopeless in a hopeless place. Back when her son had felt miles away from her guilty arms. Back when he’d believed in her before she could try believing in herself.

“Did you?” Emma blurted. 

His gaze was unflinching. “Did I what?”

“Think of me,” she whispered. “During the missing year.”

A weight rose from her shoulders, allowing her to sit tall, and face his answer. In New York, in the drive to Storybrooke, in the times when she wasn’t with him, her lies that she would survive this, she would survive if he admitted no, if he told her his life had gone on, if their kiss was far from his mind. 

Their gazes met. 

He always hesitated now. Struggling to see if answering her was worth watching her run. 

She leaned forward, features cracked open. 

He leaned forward, features threading the relief of telling her. 

“Yes.” He swallowed roughly. “Every day.”

He wasn’t the only one who found relief. “Good,” she smiled a little smile. “And hey,” in a flash she was grabbing his hand, squeezing his fingers, listening to the bravery pumping through her veins. “I, uh, did miss you.”

Missing him had been like breathing. She did it unconsciously in her sleep. She did it because her lungs demanded oxygen. She’d woken up and he was still a breath of fresh air. He was still the feeling she felt without thinking. 

A grin cut the dimples on his face and crinkled the corners of his eyes. “Well I believe that is music to this pirate’s ears.”

She smiled. 

_ Same.  _

This time, she offered him her cup of cocoa. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> -Song used: Amor Sincero (True Love)  
> By: Alexander Acha -Featuring Zuria Vega
> 
> -Thoughts?


End file.
